Genre:

Poetry

Subjects:

Exhibitions, Industry, Machinery, Skill, Agriculture, Work

    Describes a meeting between 'Strong Queen Handicraft' and 'Fair Queen Art' at midnight in the silence of the 'monster Building' of the International Exhibition. They discuss each other's contributions to the products on display. Art insists that Handicraft owns the 'profusion / Of the fruits of toil, / Loom and forge-work, clay and crystal', the 'Growth of seed and soil' and the 'spinning of men-spiders, / Honey of men's hives'. Handicraft, clad in a 'Coal-black' robe, a crown of fire, and wielding a hammer as a sceptre, informs Art that it is she who gives beauty to her roughly shaped masses. Art adds that in 'this age of iron' she is 'Chain'd to thy "behest"'. The queens each continue to give reasons why the other should sit on the 'throne', with Art finally deciding to reign apart in her own gallery.